Reese leaned his elbows on the bar. He smiled again—a nice smile, wide and infectious, with straight white teeth and full lips framed by a stubbly brown beard. His eyes smiled, too. “Well, I don’t know. I’m full up here, but—well, you know what? Might be somethin’ up at the Moondancer. Catherine was just down here the other night, complainin’ that she’d had to let a couple newbies go.”
“The Moondancer? That’s the place I saw the poster for? The…dude ranch?” She felt embarrassed saying the words.
But Reese nodded. “Yep. You ever do any hotel work?”
“No, but I waited tables since I was fourteen.”
“Then you should go up there tomorrow, talk to Catherine. She might have somethin’.”
“Is it far?”
“Nah. ‘Bout fifteen miles.”
Gabe laughed and almost snorted Corona. To cover, she finished the bottle. Swallowing a belch, she asked, “Is there a bus in town? Or a cab?”
Waving her empty bottle and getting a nod from her, Reese pulled a fresh bottle from the ice and popped the top. “Right—your truck. Sorry, Gabe. There’s just the shuttle from the Moondancer, but that only runs for the guests. Hey—hold up.” He took a couple of steps away, toward the end of the bar nearest the pool tables. “Heath! You’re headin’ up to Catherine’s tomorrow, yeah?”
Gabe watched as Hatless set his chair down on all fours. “Yeah,” he said. Nothing more. But Reese waved him to the bar, and Hatless—whose name appeared to be Heath—stood up and came over. His friends watched avidly.
“What you need?” Heath spoke to Reese; he didn’t acknowledge Gabe at all, like she was beneath his notice.
He was not beneath hers, however. He was tall and broad, diminishing Reese’s previously impressive size by his proximity. And he had the squarest jaw Gabe had ever seen. His brown hair was trimmed short but still a bit disordered, as if he didn’t bother with a comb, and his skin had a pale bronze tint, like a light suntan. Probably exactly a light suntan—he had the creases at the corners of his eyes that said he did a lot of squinting into the sun.
His voice had managed to be both soft and coarse, like silk over gravel—the kind of voice a woman could feel down deep inside. Caramba.
The last thing Gabe wanted just now was to get tangled up with another person, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t appreciate a hot man.
“This here is Gabe. Gabe, this is my buddy Heath.” At Reese’s introduction, Heath swiveled his head and looked down at her. The bar was dim, and he only glanced at her before his eyes slid away, but those eyes were pale—green or blue, or some combination of the two. Nice.
She smiled, hoping it didn’t look young or eager or stupid. “Hi.”
He didn’t smile, or speak, but he nodded. Then he turned back to Reese. “What you need?” he repeated.
“Gabe is thinkin’ about stayin’, if she can find work. I told her Catherine was lookin’, but she needs a ride. Since you’re goin’ up there, how ‘bout you take her along?”
“No,” he said without looking Gabe’s way.
Frankly, she was shocked. Everybody, not counting Mary, had been nice to her in Jasper Ridge so far, and even Mary had been helpful. She’d expected Heath to say yes. She’d even been silently rehearsing what she’d say to him to show her gratitude without sounding dumb or desperate.
“Aw, come on, Heath,” Reese said as his friend turned away.
Without thinking about what she was doing, Gabe reached out and grabbed Heath’s arm. He wore a denim jacket, but under it she felt a heavily muscled forearm. God.
He stopped and stared down at her hand, but didn’t turn back or say a word.
“Please,” she said. “I’d take a bus if there was one. I can pay.”
That finally brought his eyes to hers. “Don’t need your money.”
“Please,” she said again.
He made an irritated face. “You at the Gemstone?”
Relief made her grin. “Yes. Room—”
“—I don’t need to know your room. Be outside the office at seven-thirty. A.M. Sharp.”
Before she got the words “Thank you” out, he’d shaken her hand off and stalked back to his table.
No chance of getting tangled up with him, obviously.
When she turned back to the bar, Reese grinned ruefully. “Don’t mind Heath. He’s good people. Just not too sociable.”
“That’s obvious. But at least I got a ride.” As she sat on the nearest stool, her stomach rumbled angrily. “Thanks to you. Hey—do you serve food?”
“Real food, yeah.” He laughed—a warm, inclusive sound. “If you’re one of those vegan weirdoes, then you’ll prob’ly starve around here.”
She was not a vegan weirdo. “Cheeseburger and fries? Medium rare?”
“That’s what I’m sayin’!” He waved sharply, like he was shooing a pest, and Gabe looked behind her and saw a couple of cowboy types backing away. When she faced Reese again, he winked. “I’ll hold ‘em at bay, ‘less you want company.”
“I really, really don’t. I don’t mind talking to you, though.” She didn’t. He felt almost like a friend. It had been a long time since she’d had one of those.
He winked again—friendly, not flirty. “I’ll get Alf on your burger, then.”
*****
They chatted while she ate, and Reese told her some of the history of Jasper Ridge. By the time she’d finished her burger, she knew that Old Town really was the original town, and that the Jack was housed in the original saloon, which had been in continuous operation since the 1870s, though the name was only as old as his family’s ownership. Reese’s grandfather had bought the place during hard times for the town and brought it back from crumbling decay.
After she finished her dinner and washed it all down with another beer, she pulled her wallet from her back pocket and settled up, adding a good tip. She’d heard people say you weren’t supposed to tip the owner or manager of a place, but from the other side of that transaction, she knew that money was money, and acknowledgement of good service was appreciated by anyone.
He nodded when she waved away his offer to make change. “Thank you, Miss Gabe—the pretty woman with the manly name.”
“Thank you. If everybody around here’s as nice as you, then Jasper Ridge is a pretty great place.”
He laughed. “Well, you’ve already seen we got nice people and not-so-nice, just like anyplace else. But yeah, I think it’s alright. You rest up—Heath wasn’t jokin’ about the time he’d be there. He won’t wait around.”
“Okay. Thanks again. I’ll see you—I’ll let you know if I have any luck tomorrow.”
“You won’t have to. Bet I know before you get back down here.” He winked again. “Have a good night, Gabe.”
As she walked to the door, she saw Heath alone at the same table, watching her. When their eyes met, he lingered just a beat and then looked away.
*****
Back in Room 10 of the Gemstone Motor Inn, Gabe—the more she said it to herself and to others, the more it sounded like her name—lay on the cheap, rustic-patterned bedspread and stared up at the wagon-wheel light fixture in the ceiling. The whole town had really bought into the Wild West shtick.
Idaho didn’t seem very far from where she’d started out. Something like a thousand miles. It felt like giving up to stop so soon.
Maybe the breakdown wasn’t a sign. Maybe it was just bad luck. Or stupidity—what kind of idiot took a road trip in a truck that had been sitting in a garage for two years?
Maybe instead of going up to the dude ranch with that sour asshole, she should go back to see Jerk and go ahead and pay for the repair. It would only leave her a few hundred dollars, but…
No. A few hundred dollars wouldn’t do anything for her. One way or another, she needed to stay in this town and work. It didn’t mean she had to stay long-term, though. She could work just long enough to afford a new transmission, and then she could get back on the road.
She didn’t need to decide whether Jasper Ridge was her real end point right now, but she did need a job. So she’d be waiting for Heath when he rolled up at seven-thirty the next morning.
With that resolved, she got up, shed her jeans and socks, wriggled her bra out from under her t-shirt, took off the black leather choker she wore every day, and climbed under the synthetic bedspread. Once she was settled, she turned on the television, keeping the volume low. She was too tired to watch, but she felt less lonely with its human sounds in her ears as she slipped into sleep.
Chapter Four
The hands on the little plastic clock in the motel office window said that it would open again at nine a.m., so at twenty past seven the next morning, Gabe stood on the sidewalk outside the office door, next to a barrel full of sand that was obviously meant as an ashtray. The morning was overcast and chilly; she shoved her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket and shrugged down into the neckline a little.
Without many options in the way of clothing, she’d dressed in a clean pair of jeans, a black v-neck t-shirt, and her boots. She’d left her long hair loose and hoped that this Catherine person wouldn’t expect business attire to discuss a job doing what would most likely be grunt work.
She’d come out a few minutes early, feeling suspicious about Heath’s intent to pick her up. His reluctance had been palpable, to say the least—so she wasn’t surprised when he turned in at seven-twenty-five and seemed, through the windshield, disappointed to find her already waiting.
His truck was an enormous black monster, a big Dodge hemi with a strange kind of black, camper-like thing over the bed. He stopped right in front of her and opened his door, and Gabe saw a magnetized sign on it, black and white, that showed an anvil, hammer, and tongs on one side, and a horseshoe on the other, framing the words:
Hephaestus Farrier & Smithy
Heath Cahill, AFA CJF
70010 Ridge Road, Jasper Ridge, ID
555-910-9100
Gabe grinned as Heath came to her. She enjoyed ancient mythology, and she thought Hephaestus, the Greek god of the forge, a basically perfect name for a blacksmith. Better than the Roman Vulcan, because not as many people knew Hephaestus, and because people knew ‘Vulcan’ for other reasons than blacksmithing.
So he was a blacksmith. That accounted for the massive forearms, then. She hadn’t heard the word ‘farrier’ before, but the horseshoe on the sign gave her an idea what it meant.
“Morning,” he said as he came to the front of his truck. He didn’t drop his ‘g.’ All of the (three) other people she’d spoken to in town so far had.
“Morning,” she answered, but he’d already rounded the front end and had his back to her. She was surprised when he opened the passenger door. ‘Chivalrous’ wouldn’t have been a word she’d have used for him, in their short acquaintance.
“Thanks.” She got in and let him close the door, then watched as he rounded the front end again and climbed in behind the wheel. Between them, on the ceiling in some kind of contraption, was a worn, brown cowboy hat. It wasn’t ill-used, like the wad of straw Jerk had smashed down on his head, but it had obviously been worn daily for a long time of hard work.
She tried to imagine it on Heath’s head. If she squinted, she could see a line of paler skin on his forehead, an inch or so below his hairline.
His eyes slid toward her as he checked the mirror at her side to back out of the parking space, and he caught her studying him that closely. He stopped and held her gaze, really looking back at her for the first time. His eyes were definitely green—a pale green, almost like mint.
“Problem?”
Embarrassed, searching for something to say, she landed on, “Thank you. Again. For the ride. It’s a real help. Thanks.”
He cocked his head dismissively and got back to the business of driving. “Going up there anyway,” he said as he pulled out onto the road.
The silence felt oppressively horrible right from the start, so Gabe searched her head for something, anything, chatty to say. Even if he just grunted at her, even if he completely ignored her, she’d feel better filling up the space with her own words, at least.
“You’re a farrier, huh? That’s a horseshoer, right?”
He nodded.
“Is that why you’re going up to the”—oh shit, she’d forgotten the name—“um, the Moon…”
That got a quick glance in her direction, and possibly an upward twitch at the corner of his mouth. “Moondancer. Yeah. I take care of her stable. Full season opens in a couple days.” He shifted his eyes in her direction again. “I’ll be up there all day. If you need a ride back, it’ll be some waiting.”
She hadn’t thought any farther ahead than getting up there and getting a job. Stupid. “Uh…I guess I probably will. I’m happy to wait, if you’re okay bringing me back.”
He shrugged. “Gotta come back down anyway.”
What a charmer. But he was, at least, holding something like a conversation. After another minute of so of silence, while nothing but fields passed by, she tried to keep it going. “What’s AFACJF?”
“’Scuse me?”
“On your sign. It says, ‘Heath Cahill, AFACJF.’”
“Ah. American Farrier’s Association, Certified Journeyman Farrier.”
“So you’re good, then.”
“I’d say so.” Another quick look her way. “You know much about horses?”
“Not really. I went on a couple of trail rides when I was a kid, but the kind where the horse just plodded along, following his buddies. I held the reins, but that was mostly for show. I like them, though. They’re pretty.”
He actually chuckled at that. “Yeah, they are. You stay around here, you’ll need to get to know them more than that.”
“I guess you’ve been riding horseback all your life.”
“Yep. Was in the saddle before I could walk. Same as most everybody out here.”
He looked at her again, his eyes staying on her for a second or two this time, and then he seemed to realize that he was talking and decide he was doing it too much. He frowned and faced forward.
Despite Gabe’s continuing efforts, that was the last of Heath’s words until they’d crossed under an arch with the words ‘Moondancer Ranch’ and he’d parked near an enormous barn.
He pulled his hat down from the ceiling, and they got out. He went to the back of the truck and opened the hatch. Gabe, who’d followed his lead and also gone to the back, saw that the strange black camper thing held what appeared to be a mini-forge.
“You make horseshoes right here?” When she looked up at him she saw that he had his brown cowboy hat on. Her imagination had not done that sight justice.
He seemed surprised she was still around. “No. But sometimes I don’t have a cold shoe that’ll work for a horse, and I have to shape what I’ve got.” He unfastened some part of the truck and pulled an anvil out. “Catherine’ll be up at the big house. She’s the one you want.”
Gabe turned in the direction that seemed to be ‘up,’ along the sweeping drive toward a house on the hill which looked like a log cabin on all the steroids. There were other buildings, but that was a ‘big house,’ to be sure.
It was clear that he wanted her away, so Gabe said, “Okay. Thanks,” and headed up toward the big house, hoping this Catherine had a job for her.
*****
Inside, the big log cabin looked like the lobby of a fancy hotel, except with log beams and western patterns on the upholstery. A slender, pretty woman in jeans and an elaborately embroidered shirt stood behind the reception desk and smiled brightly as Gabe approached. “Hiya. Welcome to the Moondancer Ranch. We’re not open for guests today, but if you’d like a tour, I can call up a ranch hand.”
A blue tag on her shirt labeled her as ‘Pearl.’
“Hi…Pearl. I’m Gabe. I’m not a guest. Reese at the Apple Jack Saloon told me to come up and talk to Catherine about a job.”
“Oh! Sorry. Sure. Hold on, please.” She pick
ed up the desk phone, but then put it back on its base without saying anything. “Catherine!”
Gabe spun around in the direction Pearl had called out, and an elegant woman, about Gabe’s mother’s last age, with dark, thick hair like her mother’s, came over from a wide hallway across the lobby. She was, like Pearl, wearing jeans and a fancy shirt with pearl buttons and flowers embroidered along the plackets.
“Don’t shout, Pearl, please.”
“Sorry. This is…I’m sorry, I don’t recall your name?”
“Gabe.” Gabe held out her hand. “I’m here to apply for work. Reese sent me up.”
Catherine shook her hand. “Did he now? You must have caught his eye.” She scanned her head to toe with an evaluative eye. “I can see why.”
Gabe didn’t think that was true. Reese hadn’t flirted with her at all. But she only smiled; she was smart enough to know not to disagree with the person she was asking to hire her.
“What experience do you have? Housekeeping? Livestock work?”
“No. But I worked as a waitress at my grandparents’ restaurant from the time I was fourteen, and before that, I did busing. I also did some kitchen prep.”
“Since you were fourteen, huh? And how long’s that been, then?”
Everybody wanted to know her age. “Seven years.” Gabe left off the supplemental fact that she hadn’t worked in two years. Five years’ experience was five years’ experience.
“You got references?”
Gabe felt a twist of anxiety. Another thing she hadn’t thought of. Thinking quickly now, she said, “My grandparents are dead, and their restaurant closed after that. I never worked anywhere else. But I can give you character references.”
It wasn’t like she was actively hiding. She could list the prosecuting attorney, whom she’d gotten to know well during the trial, and she could list her neighbor, Mrs. Brant. And her English teacher from her last semester at community college. She’d been in that class when everything had happened, and Professor Laughlin had visited her in the hospital regularly and helped her actually finish out the semester.
Somewhere (Sawtooth Mountains Stories Book 1) Page 4